EPA chief: Feds not targeting Texas

She says permitting move about health, not politics.

By Tracy Idell Hamiltonthamilton@express-news.net :
January 29, 2011

Local officials show EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson (second from right) the solar array on the roof of St. Philip's College. Jackson was in town Friday to attend a green jobs roundtable discussion at the collage.

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The Environmental Protection Agency is not out to cripple Texas business, said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson during a visit to San Antonio on Friday.

She took issue with the rhetoric coming from Gov. Rick Perry and other Republican lawmakers, such as Rep. Ted Poe, a Humble Republican, who recently declared that “the EPA is at war with Texas,” after the federal agency moved to take over air permitting from the state.

“This isn't about politics, and this isn't about a war of words in the media,” Jackson said after a question-and-answer session with St. Mary's University students outside a small coffee shop on campus. “This is about air pollution and health.”

The topic of Texas' fight against the EPA and parts of the Clean Air Act followed Jackson at every stop on her San Antonio tour.

“Businesses in Texas deserve to get legal permits,” she said, and the EPA believes that those issued by the Perry-appointed Texas Commission on Environmental Quality do not comply with federal law and would not stand up to legal scrutiny.

“That determination was made by another son of Texas. It was the Bush Administration — George W. Bush — that made the finding that the flexible permits don't pass muster,” she said.

The so-called “flexible” permit caps emissions of air pollutants from an entire facility. The EPA says they must limit emissions from each polluting unit of a plant individually.

The stricter rules are expected to add costs for companies.

A majority of those companies are now working directly with the EPA to bring their state-issued permits into compliance, but Texas has filed suit to block the EPA's actions, asserting there is no legal or technical justification to deny the permits.

Jackson said her agency also has issues with TCEQ's “lack of transparency and openness.”

Communities ought to be able to see clearly what a company is asking for permission to emit, she said: “These are toxins, after all.”

The TCEQ disagreed with Jackson's assessment, arguing that it issues permits that are protective of the environment and human health.

“Ms. Jackson cannot ignore the fact that our programs have been extremely successful in reducing air pollution in Texas, and we remain confident that we will ultimately prevail in the court system,” said spokeswoman Andrea Morrow.Earlier in the day, after touring St. Philips College, where she visited a Green Skills class and climbed onto a roof to check out the college's new 400-kilowatt solar array, Jackson pointed out that there are cities in Texas with some of the worst air quality in the country.

“It's a matter of fairness,” she said. “A Texas company shouldn't be allowed to pollute more than others.”

Jackson visited Texas as part of her “environmental justice tour,” seeking to highlight the agency's work regulating air and water.